Browser-less

I like to give periodic updates on my tech use here on the blog, especially when I make a big change. Here’s the latest one.

I deleted the browser on my phone.

I’d tried this once before, two or three years back, and I lasted only a few days. I just didn’t know how to operate as an adult without the ability to do a quick Google search—whether for a need, a want, or a request from someone else. Nor, it turns out, did I like being without a browser, because that meant I couldn’t read articles on my phone, including links shared by friends.

But I decided to give it another try about two months ago, and this time, for some reason, it wasn’t even hard to go without. I deleted Firefox, disabled Safari, and haven’t looked back once.

For a few years there I had settled into a pretty stable equilibrium. My phone had calling and texting plus Spotify, Libby, Firefox, and Marco Polo. Maybe a year ago I deleted Polo. My brothers and I had enjoyed using it since the pandemic, but we finally agreed it was better just to talk by phone rather than to talk “to” our phones in video-recorded form. That brought my average daily screen time down from 90+ minutes per day closer to 60-75, depending.

Since deleting my browser, though, it’s down to 30-40 minutes per day. Basically I now open my phone to text someone, to call someone, or to select the song or podcast I want to listen to. That’s it.

I haven’t had access to email on my phone in years, I’m not on social media, I’m not on Substack, I have zero news or website apps, no ESPN or New York Times or puzzles or games or anything else. I live in a small town in west Texas, so I don’t need Google Maps, but I keep it somewhere on the phone just in case I need to find an unknown destination, or for when I travel. And I’ll re-download Uber or Venmo or what have you as needed, when traveling, and maybe a few others.

But for all intents and purposes, on a day-to-day basis I’m down to calls, messages, and music. That’s my simple little home screen: a black-and-white rectangle with a few squares I touch when needed. This old iPhone might as well be a Spotify-enabled dumb phone.

And I love it.

Quitting the Big Five

In a course I teach on digital tech and Christian practice, I walk through an exercise with students. I ask them to name the Big Five (or more) Silicon Valley companies that so powerfully define and delimit our digital lives. They can also name additional apps and platforms that take up time and space in their daily habits. I then ask them:

Supposing you continued to use digital technology—supposing, that is, you did not move onto a tech-free country ranch, unplugged from the internet and every kind of screen—how many of these Big Tech companies could you extract yourself from without serious loss? Put from another angle, what is the fewest possible such companies you need to live your life?

In my own life, I try to implement a modest version of this. I like to daydream, however, about a more radical version. Let me start with the former then turn to the latter.

In my own life, here’s my current entanglement with the Big Tech firms:

Meta: None whatsoever (I don’t have a Facebook or Instagram account), with the exception of WhatsApp, which is useful for international and other types of communication. Recently, though, I’ve been nudging those I talk to on WhatsApp to move to another app, so I could quit Zuckerberg altogether.

Microsoft: I use Word (a lot) and PowerPoint (some) and Excel (a bit). Though I’m used to all three, I could live without them—though I’d have two decades’ worth of Word files I’d need to archive and/or convert.

Google: I’ve had the same Gmail account for fifteen years, so it would be a real loss to give it up. I don’t use GoogleMaps or any other of Google’s smartphone apps. I use GoogleDocs (etc.) a bit, mostly when others want to collaborate; I avoid it, though, and would not miss it.

Amazon: I’m an Amazon originalist: I use it for books. We pay for Prime. We also use it to buy needs and gifts for our kids and others. For years I threw my body in front of purchasing an Alexa until my household outvoted me just this summer. Alas.

Apple: Here’s where they get me. I have an iPhone and a MacBook, and I finally gave in and started backing up with a paid account on iCloud. I use iPhoto and Messages and FaceTime and the rest. I’m sure my household will acquire an iPad at some point. In a word, I’m Apple-integrated.

Others: I don’t have TikTok or any other social media accounts. My household has a family Spotify account. I personally use Instapaper, Freedom, and Marco Polo. I got Venmo this summer, but I lived without it for a decade, and could delete it tomorrow. I use Dropbox as well as another online storage business. We have various streaming platforms, but they’ve been dwindling of late; we could live with one or two.

Caveat: I’m aware that digital entanglement takes more than one form, i.e., whether or not I have an Amazon or Gmail or Microsoft (or IBM!) “account,” I’m invariably interacting with, using, and possibly paying for their servers and services in a variety of ways without my even knowing it. Again, that sort of entanglement is unavoidable absent the (Butlerian/Benedictine) move to the wireless ranch compound. But I wanted to acknowledge my awareness of this predicament at least.

Okay. So what would it look like to minimize my formal Big Five “footprint”?

So far as I can see it, the answer is simple: Commit exclusively to one company for as many services as possible.

Now, this may be seriously unwise. Like a portfolio, one’s digital assets and services may be safest and best utilized when highly diversified. Moreover, it’s almost literally putting one’s eggs in a single basket: what if that basket breaks? What if the one company you trust goes bust, or has its security compromised, or finds itself more loyal to another country’s interests than one’s own, so on and so forth?

All granted. This may be a foolish endeavor. That’s why I’m thinking out loud.

But supposing it’s not foolish, it seems to me that the simplest thing to do, in my case, would be to double down on Apple. Apple does hardware and software. They do online storage. They do TV and movies. They do music and podcasts. They’re interoperable. They have Maps and email and word processors and slideshows and the rest—or, if I preferred, I could always use third-party software for such needs (for example, I already use Firefox, not Safari or Chrome).

So what would it take, in my situation, to reduce my Big Tech footprint from five toes to three or two or even just one?

First, delete WhatsApp. Farewell, Meta!

Second, switch to Keynote and TextEdit (or Pages or Scrivener) and some unknown spreadsheet alternative, or whatever other programs folks prefer. Adios, Microsoft!

Third, download my Gmail archive and create a new, private, encrypted account with a trusted service. Turn to DuckDuckGo with questions. Turn to Apple for directions. Avoid YouTube like the plague. Adieu, Google!

Fourth, cancel Prime, ditch the Alexa, use local outlets for shopping, and order books from Bookshop.org or IndieBound.org or directly from publishers and authors. Get thee behind me, Bezos!

Fifth and finally, pray to the ghost of Steve Jobs for mercy and beneficence as I enter his kingdom, a humble and obedient subject—bound for life…

Whether or not it would be wise, could I seriously do this? I’m sort of amazed at how not implausible it sounds. The hardest thing would be leaving Microsoft Word behind, just because I’ve never used anything else, and I write a lot. The second hardest would be losing the speed, cheapness, and convenience of Amazon Prime for ordering books—but then, that’s the decision that would be best for my soul, and for authors, and for the publishing industry in general. As for life without Gmail, that would be good all around, which is why it’s the step I’m most likely to follow in the next few years.

In any case, it’s a useful exercise. “We” may “need” these corporations, at least if we want to keep living digital lives. But we don’t need all of them. We may even not need more than one.